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Comment by sam0x17 | Hacker News Reader

Curious to see how many quit over this. A lot in the tech industry (myself included) seem completely done with not working from home, especially when there is no excuse for working in-person. Tech offices for pure-software projects have also become morally indefensible from the perspective of resource consumption and climate change.

That said it's true that Apple does do some R&D that requires an in-person presence, but the number of people doing that stuff is tiny, and the vast majority of it is done entirely in software anyway.

Why is FANG trying to go back to the office? Because they all recently paid for multi-billion dollar headquarters. In the new remote economy these are useless plots of real estate, and they either haven't accepted this yet, or need to save face.

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That’s a very cynical take. Morally indefensible? That’s an incredible hyperbole. People may quit sure but CEOs are responsible for getting value to share holders and many honestly do believe that in office or hybrid model works toward that goal. If it was only about office space they could write that off and be done with it.

What value are they getting to the share holders by making people work partially from the office?

Got keep eyes on the slaves. What else.

It shouldn't be hyperbolic, but that's the world we live in. CEOs have even less of an excuse to not work from home.

How can you justify a ton of pollution, a ton of emotional and actual energy lost to commuting, millions (or billions) of dollars in real estate fees, only to reduce productivity because most studies are showing a productivity increase when working from home? There is a point where it becomes morally indefensible, and we're well past it.

My prediction: Talk is cheap and all the bellyaching will amount to maybe a temporary increase in attrition for a quarter (2x perhaps?) but negligible long term.

Commuting means an immediate 14% pay cut in time alone (ignoring CoL due to required proximity and vehicle maintenance, so it's really closer to 20%.) There are real economic forcings on the worker side against required office presence.

I don’t deny it, some will quit. But most will suck it up and no major tech firm goes full remote, merely allowing it on a case by case basis.

Here's my own prediction from going through this 5 years ago and being out of the office for awhile then going back on-site. It felt like going back and sitting in a high school classroom after I had already graduated. I had always been inside the rat maze and was suddenly outside it for the first time. My eyes were permanently opened to just how unnecessary to our jobs being physically present was and how much less I was getting done and how much more stress I had performing my work rather than doing my work.

There was no going back for me. I quit after 3 months on-site and found a remote job. I predict I will not be alone.

I feel like remote will be a powerful recruitment perk in the coming months. “We can pay you exactly what you’re making at $MEATSPACE, but we can give you full time remote.”

The costs for the company making the offer have already been realized over the past year. There’s high demand for that from candidates, and those companies can keep facilities overhead down while staffing up.

Once the talent poaching begins in earnest, that’s when I bet that we’ll see some of this get walked back.

In 2018/2019 discussions about open offices vs private spaces were all the rage. Bean counters (C*Os) were fast to position open offices as great promoters of interactions and teamwork.

Fast forward 2 years and thankfully that conversation has moved to WFH vs office work.

Presumably bean counters will be on the side of WFH, as staff no longer need the massive subsidy of office space, and in most cases won’t charge more.

this was never about bean counting. it was about power. if you can put the drones in an open space while you have your own luxurious office that’s power. if you can force the drones back in office so that you can watch them and create synergies that’s power!

Not if the bean counters built or rented out a huge office and now have to justify that purchase to higher up bean counters or shareholders.

> Curious to see how many quit over this

I already have a resignation letter written, a stash of cash set aside and earlier this year re-activated my freelancing Ltd. In the event they won't budge on my demand for 100% remote forever, I'll quit. My only compromise would be a 30% salary increase for the time wasted on commuting, or 1 on site day per month. Everything else I'm not available. Even if my next job won't be fully remote either I will at least get that 30% raise for time wasted commuting that is simply unobtainable within even 10 years in my current position (typical case of great starting salary but next to no raises if you stay).

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